Monday, July 12, 2010

Is Emmy a goddess or the whore from hell?

Congrats to all the Emmy nominees. It’s a wonderful recognition of your outstanding work.

An Emmy can really help make a show a big hit. It sure helped CHEERS.

However…

“Emmy” can also be evil.

She can also destroy a show. I’ve seen this before.

MODERN FAMILY – beware! Emmy might be targeting you in particular for her treachery.

Year one of a show – all the actors are one big happy family. Everyone is pulling for everyone else. Now five are nominated and one isn’t. Right away that can spell trouble. I can hear her cackling. In this case I don’t think it’s going to be a problem because Ed O’Neill has been there before and knows how the game is played.

But now the actors in this one big happy family are in competition with each other. Egos could get bruised. Resentments could surface. How was life on the set of CYBILL when Christine Baranski won an Emmy over Cybill Shepherd? Emmy considers that one of her masterpieces.

I’m hoping in MODERN FAMILY’S case this won’t be an issue. I hope they all realize that Emmys are subjective. Just because someone wins and you lose doesn’t mean they’re any better. And the same is true when you beat them next year. There’s also the factor that actors from one show can cancel each other out so both are robbed. (Jackee won once for God sakes!) Intellectually, everybody knows this. But it’s tough when you’re an actor and it’s your face up there on the screen. So it’s just common nature to think, “They’re rejecting ME.” Please resist that.

Good luck to all the nominees from all the shows. May Emmy smile upon you and if not, the hell with the bitch!

I'm looking forward to the Emmy Awards this year. I can't wait to watch real actors get fucked over when Matthew Fox wins best lead male actor because now that LOST is finished he'll probably never work again...

I know of one situation where the lead actor got nominated for Best Actor one season and became so overbearing and boorish, that not only did it cause a huge amount of resentment between him and the lead actress (who probably should have been rightfully nominated herself, or at the very least been given some credit for making his work look Emmy-worthy), but the producers already had a final scene written for the last episode of the season where they had him die in a plane crash, and were ready to replace him with another actor if he didn't get his shit together (no, it wasn't M*A*S*H). Fortunately that dose of reality woke him up and he started to treat the other people on the show reasonably well.

About KEN LEVINE

Named one of the BEST 25 BLOGS by TIME Magazine. Ken Levine is an Emmy winning writer/director/producer/major league baseball announcer. In a career that has spanned over 30 years Ken has worked on MASH, CHEERS, FRASIER, THE SIMPSONS, WINGS, EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND, BECKER, DHARMA & GREG, and has co-created three series. He and his partner wrote the feature VOLUNTEERS. Ken has also been the radio/TV play-by-play voice of the Baltimore Orioles, Seattle Mariners, San Diego Padres. and Dodger Talk. He hosts the podcast HOLLYWOOD & LEVINE

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